Cinematic Authorship: Writing the Film Director

Description

Examines the concept of the director as a film's author from a range of different theoretical, cultural and historical perspectives and how such figuration has been 'written' both on-screen and off. Important directors, films and scholarship in this area will be considered via some select 'case studies' in which to consider different aesthetic approaches through which we can trace divergent notions of authorship and its various problematisations.

Availability

Not currently available.

This Course was last offered in Semester 2 - 2015.

Learning Outcomes

On successful completion of the course students will be able to:

1. A detailed engagement with the critical and theoretical debates about authorship in the cinema across different historical and cultural contexts;

2. A well-developed ability to apply a range of authorship approaches to the work of particular film directors; and

3. High-level skills in textual, historical and cultural analysis of films with a depth and focus appropriate to upper-level postgraduate study.

Content

This course examines:

films by a select group of directors making up 'case studies' by which to examine and assess different debates about authorship in the cinema

the notion of cinema authorship as personified in the figure of the director, ranging from its influence as a critical approach in regards to the textual analysis of films to the ways that different films themselves construct or problematise various understandings of the author

the implications of applying a category such as directorial authorship to films in terms of production, interpretation, and cultural debate.